The Quiet Man has an IVA!

[tedsbird]

This is one for the worldly wise out there who can advise my Pops on what to do next.

Basically Pops got divorced from my mum, had to pay her off and got into serious financial trouble. Being the Quiet Man he didn't tell anyone and never answered a letter or telephone call from the companies in 9 months. He went to a debt advice centre who suggested he remortgage the house (with a £12k ERC) and pay off his creditors and get an IVA. Which he did. He remortgaged for the equity, had £42k, paid the accountants who arranged the IVA £7k (yes that was seven thousand) and paid 11 creditors £35k between them on a total of £212k (60% of that went to my mum). He went to court and was ordered to pay £400 per month for five years. The house - even without any equity is on the market.

Firstly he has had these credit cards for well over 10 years hence the high credit limit and never had a balance prior to 2 years ago.

What I would like to know is:
1) can he S.A.R - (Subject Access Request) them for the interest and charges (of which there were many)
2) can he CCA them?
3) if so to either above would he need to go back to court?

Reason I'm asking is he works on a contract basis. Whilst the courts review his P60 once a year and if he earns more then he pays more, they don't review it if he earns less. Problem is he was made redundant on Friday last week with one weeks notice. Whilst there will be a new contract on a power station somewhere for him shortly he doesn't have any income whatsoever in the meantime.

Any advice would be appreciated - I dont know much about IVA's and Pops - being the Quiet Man - doesn't tell much either!!

[powelll]

He can S.A.R - (Subject Access Request) & CCA 'em to his heart's content - If it's unsecured lending & credit card type stuff 7 it's below £25k it should be CCA regs entitling him to a breakdown of the account. He shouldn't have to go to court for this.

If he can't keep up payments on the IVA then the Insolvency Practitioner ( who originally set it up & coined it in to the tune of £7k ) or any of the creditors could in theory petition for your Pop's bankruptcy. This doesn't always happen as it's a fairly expensive route for them to go down especially if there are no assets as such 9 ie they would get diddly squat ). I have heard of some IPs telling a client that they 'have to' declare themselves bankrupt. This isn't the case. If the IP or creditors don't petition for his bankruptcy there is nothing to force him to do it himself. The IP basically doesn't want to pay out for it. Oh, and they will probably try to be nominated as the trustee for the bankruptcy instead of the Official Receiver & surprise surprise the will get fees for this...

[sequenci]

Originally Posted by powelll

I have heard of some IPs telling a client that they 'have to' declare themselves bankrupt. This isn't the case.

If the IVA fails, The superviser is duty bound to take "positive action" either via any provisions within the agreement, via directions of the court or by petitioning for bankruptcy.

Also you need to be mindfull about reclaiming any bank charges etc in case they is a "windfall" provision within the IVA.

[tedsbird]

He really doesn't want to go down the bankrupcy route. The house is on the market (with 3 sales fallen thru at 2 weeks, 10 days and on the day of completion!) and would like somewhere to live until it is sold. He's managing financially at the moment but really needs to consider what will happen if another contract doesn't happen soon (not all power stations need re-insulating!!!).
Anyway regarding the windfall - if the charges are refunded would that not reduce the amount payable each month?
If the CC companies could not produce a CCA would that then render the whole IVA process invalid?